Course enquiries

About the course

PG Diploma Chinese-English Translation and Interpreting should interest you if you want to build your language proficiency in Chinese and English, and further develop the translation and interpreting techniques that are required by employers.

Postgraduate (PG) Diplomas last for six to nine months (full-time) and include the modules and assessed work of a Masters, without a dissertation. This allows you to proceed to a Masters in Languages if your undergraduate degree was in a different subject.

Building on our internationally recognised expertise in the teaching of practical foreign language skills, our course offers written translation, oral interpreting and film and video subtitling in a single programme. By the end of your studies, you will have developed the practical language and key skills necessary for employment in professional translation, interpreting and subtitling.

Our course will build on the knowledge and skills you acquired in your previous qualifications, and is unique in the emphasis it places on hands-on training. With the help of native speakers, you learn how to use your language skills to translate, interpret and subtitle effectively, using the latest industry-standard software, in a culturally sensitive way.

You cover topics including:

Bilateral, consecutive and simultaneous interpreting

Technologies of translation

Effective note-taking

Written translation

Subtitling

We are one of the largest and most prestigious language and linguistics departments in the world, a place where talented students become part of an academic community in which the majority of research is rated ‘world-leading’ or ‘internationally excellent’ (REF 2014), placing us firmly within the top 10 departments in the UK and among the top 150 departments on the planet (QS World University Rankings 2016).

If you want a global outlook, are interested in human communication, and want to study for a degree with real-world practical value in a world-class department, welcome to Essex.

Our expert staff

Our lecturers are skilled interpreters and translators, experienced in training students with the necessary skills for professional practice. We maintain excellent student-staff ratios with capped language-specific seminars and all our language teachers are native or bilingual speakers.

Our lecturers on the PG Diploma (Dan Chen, Nan Zhao and Yanxi Wu) are professional interpreters and translators experienced in training students in the necessary skills for professional practice.

Specialist facilities

Our new interpreting lab provides 10 booths to interpret conferences with up to 20 interpreters

Use our lecture theatre equipped with five interpreting booths, and the capacity to interpret lectures of up to 350 people – we are the only university in the UK with such facilities

We regularly use two multimedia language teaching labs equipped with top-of-the-range computers integrating audio-visual projectors and large screens

Use specialist software such as SDL Trados Studio 2014 and MemoQ for technical translation, Avidanet Live and Black Box for Interpreting and WinCaps Qu4ntum for Subtitling

Use our professional recording studios to video record a small audience or for presentations

Our Languages for All programme offers you the opportunity to study an additional language alongside your course at no extra cost

Your future

Our course directly leads to a career in translation, interpreting and subtitling, in the media, business and tourism between the English-speaking world and China.

We work with the University’s Employability and Careers Centre to help you find out about further work experience, internships, placements, and voluntary opportunities.

Within our Department of Language and Linguistics, we also offer supervision for PhD and MPhil. We offer supervision in areas including language acquisition, language learning and language teaching, culture and communication, psycholinguistics, language disorders, sociolinguistics, and theoretical and descriptive linguistics.

Our graduates are successful in a wide variety of career paths. They leave Essex with a unique set of skills and experience that are in demand by employers.

Example structure

Postgraduate study is the chance to take your education to the next level. The combination of compulsory and optional modules means our courses help you develop extensive knowledge in your chosen discipline, whilst providing plenty of freedom to pursue your own interests. Our research-led teaching is continually evolving to address the latest challenges and breakthroughs in the field, therefore to ensure your course is as relevant and up-to-date as possible your core module structure may be subject to change.

For many of our courses you’ll have a wide range of optional modules to choose from – those listed in this example structure are, in many instances, just a selection of those available. Our Programme Specification gives more detail about the structure available to our current postgraduate students, including details of all optional modules.

Year 1

How do you interpret between two individual speakers, conversing in two different languages that you have studied? Develop your ability to swiftly move between your two main languages on a range of topics. Learn to quickly solve interpretation problems while providing accurate and concise spoken interpretations.

How do you interpret between two individual speakers, conversing in two different languages that you have studied? Develop your ability to swiftly move between your two main languages on a range of topics. Learn to quickly solve interpretation problems while providing accurate and concise spoken interpretations.

Are you new to interpreting and want some beginners-level training? Undertake practical activities and tasks, including participation in a mock conference, to develop your interpretation skills. Learn to understand and process the main ideas of a speech accurately and concisely. Devise your own note-taking system and build your public speaking.

Want to interpret between Chinese and English in a conference? Undertake practical activities and tasks, including participation in a mock conference, to develop your interpretation skills. Learn to produce accurate and concise interpretations that are grammatically correct. Devise your own note-taking system and build your public speaking for interpretation work.

Want to interpret and translate between Chinese and English? Develop the professional skills to sight interpret conference speeches. Learn about the functions of different source texts when undertaking sight translation. Build your knowledge and abilities in these areas in order to progress to simultaneous interpreting.

Are you proficient in both Chinese and English? Want to develop a practical experience of simultaneous interpreting? Keen to understand the syntactic difference between Chinese and English during the simultaneous interpretation process? Undertake guided exercises and examples to build your simultaneous interpretation skills for the future.

Want hands-on experience of the key technologies that aid translation today? Become a confident user of CAT (computer aided translation) in the translation environment. Practice and develop your translation and editing skills via our practical workshops, so that you are familiar with all stages of the translation process.

Want to translate English and Chinese? Develop your practical abilities to translate between these two languages. Study a range of texts, looking at topics related to society, politics, economics and business, to build your knowledge of the relevant terminology and typical constructions.

Teaching

Teaching methods include lectures, demonstrations and learning by teaching others

We run a weekly departmental seminar, attended by both staff and students

Assessment

Your eight one-term modules are assessed by coursework and you are also assessed on your dissertation

Qualifications

UK entry requirements

We will consider applications with an overall grade of 2:2 and above.

International and EU entry requirements

We accept a wide range of qualifications from applicants studying in the EU and other countries.
Email pgadmit@essex.ac.uk
for further details about the qualifications we accept. Include information in your email about the
undergraduate qualification you have already completed or are currently taking.

IELTS entry requirements

IELTS 6.5 overall with a minimum component score of 5.5 except for 6.0 in writing

If you do not meet our IELTS requirements then you may be able to complete a pre-sessional English pathway that enables you to start your course without retaking IELTS.

Applying

You can apply for our postgraduate courses online. You’ll need to provide us with your academic qualifications, as well as supporting documents such as transcripts, English language qualifications and certificates. You can find a list of necessary documents online, but please note we won’t be able to process your application until we have everything we need.

There is no application deadline but we recommend that you apply before 1 July for our taught courses starting in October. We aim to respond to applications within two weeks. If we are able to offer you a place, you will be contacted via email.

Visit us

Open days

We hold postgraduate events in February/March and November, and open days for all our applicants throughout the year. Our Colchester Campus events are a great way to find out more about studying at Essex, and give you the chance to:

tour our campus and accommodation

find out answers to your questions about our courses, student finance, graduate employability, student support and more

meet our students and staff

If the dates of our organised events aren’t suitable for you, feel free to get in touch by emailing tours@essex.ac.uk and we’ll arrange an individual campus tour for you.

Virtual tours

If you live too far away to come to Essex (or have a busy lifestyle), no problem. Our 360 degree virtual tour allows you to explore the Colchester Campus from the comfort of your home. Check out our accommodation options, facilities and social spaces.

Exhibitions

Our staff travel the world to speak to people about the courses on offer at Essex. Take a look at our list of exhibition dates to see if we’ll be near you in the future.

The University makes every effort to ensure that this information on its course finder is accurate and up-to-date. Exceptionally it can
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changes to a minimum, and will also keep prospective students informed appropriately by updating our programme specifications.

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